BIKE: God's speed bumps are on the way

[Roger Baker]

I think Shoal Creek would be a good candidate for speed bumps. I 
imagine that speed bumps should be in great favor among bicyclists 
because they slow down cars, and make them much less dangerous to 
bicyclists. (Wherever you have speed differentials among vehicles 
guided by humans, you tend to run into problems). Do you really need 
bike lanes, for safety, under these conditions?

But as the article in yesterday's Statesman said, the city is out of 
money for speed bumps. Is this necessarily a tragedy? No, and not just 
because the city of Austin has erected an opulent new hall building for 
us to debate the issue.

The guys running the planning tell us the city can't afford to put in 
mere speed bumps -- while at the same time we are building billions of 
dollars worth of toll roads on credit to serve Williamson County 
sprawl. What the city doesn't want you to know is that when mayor Wynn 
signed off on the toll roads, he was really committing to something 
like a $1.6 billion gap in secondary roadway improvements to handle the 
implied traffic (see the approved Texas Metropolitan Plan on TxDOT's 
website for more details).

Remember that there will, by the nature of the process involved, be 
some very big bond investors will now be lobbying the city council to 
facilitate the toll roads, whenever such interests might conflict with 
neighborhood concerns about fast, cut-through traffic, etc.

If the city can't even afford to build speed bumps to calm down 
neighborhood traffic as desired by central city taxpayers, then we can 
probably guarantee that the secondary road network maintained by Austin 
and expected to serve as toll road helpers will fall into disrepair.

In other words potholes, or God's speed bumps as I think of them, will 
soon be on the way to help slow down traffic as Austin's red ink gets 
worse. Maybe ten years ago, something similar happened when the city 
got way behind on maintenance but then the high tech cash started 
rolling in and the city caught up in road repair But I suspect a 
similar road neglect phase is now under way.

Some neighborhoods in other cities have resisted repair of potholes as 
conducive to safer conditions, as they see things. Like somewhere, they 
even tried to declare a pothole a historic structure. Bicyclists would 
learn to avoid potholes better than cut-through car traffic, I think, 
because their trips tend to be shorter, slower and on more predictable 
routes. If you can't get speed bumps, then nuture your potholes. You 
could even spray-paint nearby in big letters a kindly warning to 
motorists and bikes.


                    *****************************************

PS -- Just by the way, the latest prediction for a global peak in oil 
production is in 2007. (Google ASPO and ODAC and their excellent oil 
links) Of course the reason why a 42 gallon barrel of oil is currently 
selling at about $50 per barrel is because world supply cannot keep up 
with growing demand even today, before it peaks, much less after the 
peak when price will rise sharply.

I don't have time to warn of global dimming, but here's the link to 
some scary science.
<http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/dimming_trans.shtml>
Maybe the high cost of energy and subsequent industrial collapse will 
reduce this threat along with global warming. -- Roger












On Jan 18, 2005, at 10:11 AM, Lane Wimberley wrote:

> Shoal Creek Blvd. is *usually* a nice, safe place to ride/drive/walk.  
> But,
> I suspect the expert cyclist I helped load into the ambulance a few 
> years back
> after he'd been doored might be somewhat leery of that statement, as 
> might
> be the three people I know to have been hit by cars on SCB in the past 
> several
> years.  There have also been a few car accidents on SCB in that time, 
> although
> I'm not aware of any injuries to motorists.  I also am not aware of
> any accidents
> or injuries to pedestrians.
>
> It seems to me (at least) that SCB could be made a safer corridor for
> cyclists, and
> that there's possibly good reason for doing so.
>
> And, again: on a shared, public resource, cyclist safety IS more 
> important than
> resident parking convenience.
>
> -Lane
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